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Wednesday, 19 March 2014

Review: The Steady Running of the Hour: A Novel by Justin Go

In this mesmerizing
debut, a young American discovers he may be heir to the unclaimed estate
of an English World War I officer, which launches him on a quest across
Europe to uncover the elusive truth.

Just after graduating
college, Tristan Campbell receives a letter delivered by special courier
to his apartment in San Francisco. It contains the phone number of a
Mr. J.F. Prichard of Twyning & Hooper, Solicitors, in
London and news that could change Tristan's life
forever.

In 1924, Prichard explains, an English alpinist named
Ashley Walsingham died attempting to summit Mt. Everest, leaving his
fortune to his former lover, Imogen Soames-Andersson. But the estate was
never claimed. Information has recently surfaced suggesting Tristan may
be the rightful heir, but unless he can find documented evidence, the
fortune will be divided among charitable beneficiaries in less than two
months.

In a breathless race from London archives to Somme
battlefields to the Eastfjords of Iceland, Tristan pieces together the
story of a forbidden affair set against the tumult of the First World
War and the pioneer British expeditions to Mt. Everest. Following his
instincts through a maze of frenzied research, Tristan soon becomes
obsessed with the tragic lovers, and he crosses paths with a mysterious
French girl named Mireille who suggests there is more to his quest than
he realizes. Tristan must prove that he is related to Imogen to inherit
Ashley's fortune; but the more he learns about the
couple, the stranger his journey becomes.

I received a copy of this book from the publisher Simon & Schuster via Edelweiss in exchange for an honest review. The expected publication date is April 15 2014.

I wanted to like this book, I really did. The synopsis sounded intriguing and right up my alley. Unfortunately the story fell short for me. While it had some good "bones" to the story I found that it lacked the structure to keep me interested. It is almost like the story suffered an identity crisis and did not know what direction it should take.

To offer some constructive criticism the story was simply too long and focused on the wrong parts of the story. The descriptions of the war and the climbing expeditions could have been shortened or eliminated all together as they brought no real value to the storyline. At times I was forcing myself to get through these parts. I think that simplifying the story and focusing on the main point would have resulted in a much better read. I still really don't know what the story was supposed to be telling me.

I will not give away the plot as the synopsis loosely explains the story. I will summarize that the story seems to centralize around a wild goose chase that I am apparently still on as I try to decipher what I just spent the last few hours reading. I hate when I give a review that is not very favorable but alas I promised an honest review when the book was provided to me. While I think that Go has potential I feel he fell short on this endeavour.

I cannot recommend this book.

About the Author

JUSTIN GAKUTO GO was born in
Los Angeles to a Japanese father and an American mother. He was trained
as a historian at UC Berkeley and holds an MA in English from
University College London. Justin has lived in Tokyo, Paris, London,
New York City and Berlin, among other places.

He recently
completed his first book, The Steady Running of the Hour, a literary
novel about a young man’s quest to inherit a fortune from the 1920s. The
book involves many historical settings, including the Battle of the
Somme and the British 1924 Mount Everest Expedition.